Home
by Burning Ice Phoenix
Summary: Semi-AU It is a struggle to come to terms with the fact that China gave her a home and a family. This home doesn't last forever.


Whenever their eyes meet, they always look away in embarrassment. Nobody ever notices, of course, because no one wants to notice. Everyone has their own problems and theirs was always just too messy to be dealt with. Between some people, it is best to let them work everything out on their own. (Since, the few times that America has offered to help out, all he received were glares and threats for his efforts.)

He wonders when the years turned into decades and centuries as he sits across from her. Whoever decided it was a good idea to seat them opposite each other during this world meeting must have either been really stupid or really sadistic. The entire time, she looked away, pretending to pay attention when Germany spoke, but he could see her eyes dart to the corner and look at him and the moment the eyes see each other, they look away once more.

He sighed in his seat and spun the pen between his fingers. He wondered if she still remembers, still remembers the days when she cared and loved him instead of the hatred she sends him now. No, it's not quite hatred. There is just a lot of anger and bitterness between them.

* * *

><p>The house is quiet as China looks up and down the halls. Everyone is sleeping at this time of the night. The house is built in the capital city and within the palace walls. If it wasn't for its size and the gold painted roofs, it would look like any other servants' house. He was no servant and anyone who walked by the man would know. He never got sick when a bug went around the palace, his wounds would heal quicker than anyone else, and the young girls who worked as servants all their lives would still remember the same features as they grew old. Yes, he was different. As was everyone else who lived in that better-than-a-servant house. But even they got sick and died, sometimes.<p>

China would bring someone that looked like a prisoner into the house, treat them with the finest silk clothing and the tastiest food, but after a while, they would all move on to the next world. Recently, there was a little girl pulled in by the guards. She was not tame and accepting of her fate and instead, she bit the guards and glared up at the man who would be her "older brother" until she died.

As China walked down the halls with a candle lit lantern, he thought of the little girl and how she refused to come inside the whole three weeks she's been here. Instead, she took up residence in front of the house, preferring to sleep outside on her own rather than with her new brothers and sisters. China sighed, at least it was summer and the nights were warm. It was quite frustrating, really, to have a warm bed provided for someone only to have them refuse to step outside of the house.

China pushed open a door and placed the lantern on a table. It takes only a couple of minutes before he's dressed and he can already feel uneasiness mix inside his stomach with weaker emotions of love, hate, and confusion. His brothers were already on the battlefield. If he stayed here any longer, he wouldn't make it in time to help.

Helmet tucked under one arm; China picked opened the door again and was about to pick up the lantern to walk out to the barn when a little figure appeared before him.

"Oh!" he let out in surprise. The little girl they had dragged in and demanded to stay outside was…inside? While he was happy she finally decided to come inside, he was curious as to why now of all times. Why when he was about to leave the household for a good while?

She mumbled something in her native language and China couldn't understand her, "I'm sorry, can you say that again?" She repeated herself and it's no use; she got frustrated and said it again, this time in Mandarin.

"Where are you going?" she demanded and China is surprised, she knew how to speak Mandarin? There is no answer and she glares at him, annoyed, "Where are you going?"

"Ah…nowhere," he wasn't sure what to say. Does this little girl even understand what war was? There was no war between the two of them when China dragged her out of her island home. Just a lot of struggling, complaining, and rock throwing. He briefly wondered how the settlement was going on there.

She narrowed her eyes and pat the metal armor on China, "Liar, you're all dressed up for somewhere."

China chuckles, "Are you worried about me, Taiwan?"

Her cheeks flare up and she turns away, "No, I was simply curious about where someone would go in the middle of the night!" With that said, she turned around and walked down the hall to the door, going back to stay in her own little make shift bed outside the better-than-a-servant's house.

As China picked up the lantern, he couldn't help but to think, _she really is a stubborn girl_, with a hint of a smile of amusement stretching across his face. He goes out the back door to the barn and to the place where his horse is tied. He patted it gently with the whip to wake the horse before climbing on.

The horse trotted about the narrow palace streets and has to pass by the front of the house before exiting the walls. The lantern shines his path and by the gate of the house, a small shadow shows up, "You never told me, where are you going?"

"I'll be back soon, go back to sleep."

"Where are you going?" she repeats, refusing to drop the subject.

"Listen up, I'm the older one here, go back to—"

"Where are you going," a demand this time, not a question.

China sighed, "If I tell you, will you go back to sleep?" She nods. "I'm going to the Eastern borders, ok? My brothers are being annoying."

Taiwan stares at him for a moment longer and China wondered why he listened to a child and stayed to explain. He should be on his way to the battlefield already. Finally, she steps away from the gate and goes back to her make shift bed to enjoy the view of the stars above.

"I'll be back soon!" China called, but didn't get a response. He briefly wondered if she liked sleeping outside because it was what she did in her island home.

The horse trotted forward slowly before they arrived at the palace gates. The guards step aside and the heavy doors are pushed open. Once outside, China was free to gallop down the empty streets of the city and towards the battlefield.

* * *

><p>"Where is Brother Yao?" one of the younger boys asked. He was the one who had gone with Yao to invade her island, but strangely, she does feel a slight familial bond with him.<p>

Taiwan shrugs and he walks off, gone to start the chores of the day. Taiwan didn't do any chores, refused to do them. There was only more kicking and biting if they tried to get her to do anything. Today, she chose to pick up a stick and sit on the stairs drawing pictures in the dirt. Absentmindedly, she had written a few Chinese characters in the dirt and when she heard someone approach from inside the house, she quickly stamped it out with her feet.

A few more days pass and as the bunch of them eat at the dinner table; they wear worried looks on their faces. "Where is Yao?" one of them asked, "I haven't seen him for days and the servants haven't either." The bunch of them discussed whether or not it was a good idea to try and ask the emperor, but all of them wind up too chicken about it.

Taiwan sat tight as she picked up her bowl of rice. Not her business to worry, she came here because China pulled her in, she doesn't have to be worried about him.

As night turned into day and day back into night, Taiwan watched and counted the moon. She remembered when China left, the moon was half full and it was nearly the same shape now. So a month had passed. Didn't he say he would be back soon?

Two more weeks later and the entire city was in celebration. "It's over, let's have a feast!" There are red lanterns and lots of games as Taiwan wandered down the streets. The older brothers and sisters were supposed to be taking care of her, but they have all gone somewhere else. She didn't mind, but as she stopped in front of a calligraphy booth, she couldn't help but think of China. He wrote a lot, she remembered, many scrolls to be sent off to the emperor to approve. Where was he now?

She's walking further and further away from the main portion of the celebration, to the edge of the city. Taiwan walked slowly down the quiet streets. She stopped and stared at empty and dark houses and when she was near the gate, she heard voices.

"Get it together, will you?"

"Shut up. You didn't just loose a battle. Just get me some booze and I'll get right back to kicking your butt."

There was a loud sigh, "Why are all my brothers so stupid? So goddamn stupid and fighting all the time, aru?"

"I'm not stupid," Taiwan blurts out before she could stop herself. China turns around in surprise. "Who is this?"

"Nobody important, aru," China hissed in reply. He was really ticked off, his verbal tic coming out without any restraint, "Why're you here, Taiwan—"

China doesn't finish his sentence because Taiwan comes up to hug him, "What's the matter—"

"I'm glad you're home," she mumbled nervously. Beside them, China's brother laughs and mocks them and China promptly hits him on the head yelled at him to report to their oldest brother in the throne room. China stroked Taiwan's hair and for the first time ever, she felt happy to be a part of a family.

* * *

><p>They all come and go, some of them fading away and out of existence, but Taiwan is still there. She grows up near the palace and is thrown back and forth, feeling betrayed by her older brother at times, only to see that he really had no choice in any of the matters.<p>

Each time, she forgave him.

But this time, this time, she couldn't believe him. He was a mess. A mess of drugs, a mess of humiliation, completely used by foreign powers. His brothers were no longer here to guide him, all faded away and all that's left are some provinces who are younger than him and don't know what to do.

"China!" she yells at him as Japan, the boy she had a school girl crush on a long time ago, drags her away. "China!" she calls again, trying to get his attention, but all he does is look down. "China!" she calls one final time before she is pulled out the door and accepted into yet another foreign nation. Sure, this was the boy that would occasionally come over to China's house to play, but she didn't want to leave just again.

Years later, she would come back completely different and China would run up to her and give her a tight hug. And after saying, "I'm glad you come home," each time, there finally came a time when Taiwan responded with something else.

"This isn't home anymore."

* * *

><p><strong>I originally intended to write this for the Kink meme. But then my little plot bunny went off on a tangent and somehow, it's has nothing to do with the prompt anymore. Hell, I'm questioning how historically correct this is. I didn't do a lot of research, just wrote with a goal in mind and then having that goal disappear. facepalm. Yea, I know, I fail.**

**Have some notes:**

**According to Wikipedia, there is archeological evidence that the Chinese settled on the island of Taiwan some point waaaay back when and so I assumed that they would've met in that way. China never conquered Taiwan, only tried and failed to settle there. (Yes, there is a detail here that my brain seemed to have made up for the sake of plot. …Settlement was in 12****th**** century BC…whoops.)**

**In several different time periods, all china did was fight amongst each other. This is what confused me the most and therefore, did not really give any names to the OCs, but they were all provinces or states of China that managed to break away and reign free for a bit. I imagine they're quite influential to him, and like annoying older brothers who want the big piece of land for themselves.**

**And then afterwards, it's modern history. It is headcannon to me that Taiwan only had a small crush on Japan and then moved on. Also headcannon that she liked Yao as a brother until he became a halfway colonized nation for foreign powers. **

…**One day I'll write a proper and correct historical fanfiction for China. Cause this does it no justice, hence, semi-AU Dx;**


End file.
